Tuesday, March 03, 2015

Meet The Bears Of Sweet Paul

The foodies among you may already by familiar with Sweet Paul, which began years ago as Paul Lowe's personal cooking blog and has since grown to become a wildly popular print and online magazine. Lowe (above left, also known as "the gay Martha Stewart") does the kitchen work while the business side of the enterprise is handled by "the other Paul" - my longtime pal Paul Vitale. The fifth anniversary issue of Sweet Paul launches next week and I'm just the worst friend ever not to have mentioned them before now. And hey, they've even put out a well-received cookbook, Summer Food: New Summer Classics. Join their 70,000 fans on Facebook.

Today In GOP Infighting

Slovenia Legalizes Same-Sex Marriage

By a vote of 51-28 the Slovene Parliament has just amended that country's Marriage & Family Relations Act to legalize same-sex marriage, becoming the 12th European nation to do so. All but Iceland and Norway are members of the European Union. How do you like them apples, World Congress of Families? I'm being told by a Slovene JMG reader that the "evil hounds of hell" are already calling for a referendum to repeal today's action. A poll issued last month showed that 59% of Slovenes support same-sex marriage.

Charlotte Haters: We're Not Nazis

TEXAS: Let's Copy Arkansas And Ban Every City From Enforcing LGBT Rights

A Fort Bend County Republican has introduced a bill that would prohibit cities from enforcing ordinances protecting LGBT people against discrimination. State Rep. Rick Miller’s House Bill 1556 would bar cities from adopting nondiscrimination ordinances that include protected classes not contained in state law. Texas law doesn’t include sexual orientation or gender identity and expression. If passed, Miller’s bill would undo LGBT protections passed by numerous cities, including Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, El Paso, Fort Worth, Houston and Plano. Altogether more than 7.5 million Texans are covered by such ordinances.

RELATED: Last week West Virginia GOP lawmakers also tried to copy Arkansas, but the Republican head of the state Senate has declared that there is "no way" that the bill will be heard in his chamber.

Eric Holder On The DOJ's Marriage Brief

"This week, the Justice Department will file a brief setting forth our position that state bans on same-sex marriage violate the fundamental constitutional guarantee of 'equal protection of the laws.' It is clear that the time has come to recognize that gay and lesbian people deserve robust protection from discrimination. Nothing justifies excluding same-sex couples from the institution of marriage. Denying them the right to marry serves only to demean them and their children, to degrade the dignity of their families and to deny them the full, free and equal participation in American life to which every citizen is entitled.

"I am proud to have had the opportunity not only to watch this great national pivot, but to take part in it. In 2011, I recommended to President Obama that the Department of Justice no longer defend the constitutionality of Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act, which excluded gay and lesbian couples from federal marriage benefits. In my view, DOMA was indefensible, and the Supreme Court vindicated that position in a landmark decision in 2013. I will always be proud of the role that the Justice Department played in achieving and implementing that victory, which has driven a surge of court decisions securing marriage rights in states from coast to coast." - United States Attorney General Eric Holder, writing for USA Today.

HRC Claims Record With "People's Brief"

According to the Human Rights Campaign, their People's Brief to the US Supreme Court has garnered over 207,000 signatures, a record for an amicus brief. HRC head Chad Griffin: "Each and every signature on this brief – more than 200,000 of them – is a piece of evidence that this country is ready for marriage equality. Through this historic document, the American people, LGBT and allies alike, are standing shoulder to shoulder to insist on fairness for all. Ultimately, this brief tells a simple truth – the Constitution cannot tolerate discrimination, and it's time for all couples to be treated equally under the law." The brief will be delivered to SCOTUS on Friday.

HomoQuotable - Noah Michelson

"From Grindr profiles that demand 'masc only' to men like [Russell] Tovey who think their masculinity -- however manufactured, however antithetical to who they truly were when they landed on this planet -- is what makes them marketable or desirable, our obsession with what it means to be a man and what it means to fall short of that is keeping us from becoming truly liberated.

"If it weren't for my father, I wouldn't be who I am today. I could have been forced to play football in hopes that it would somehow unleash the man dozing inside of me. I could have been sent to therapy in hopes that I could be reprogrammed, repaired, made whole. I could have ended up with a belt around my neck and swinging from the light fixture in our formal dining room. But I wasn't. But I didn't. I am one of the lucky ones.

"My father died eight years ago. He never got to see the man that I've become and we never specifically talked about everything he did for me -- what he made me -- simply by loving me. Without a son of my own, it's a gift that I can only attempt to pay forward to the thousands of boys and men who come after me -- who brush past me in crowded subway cars or surround me on Facebook or might be reading this now -- by speaking up and saying I am a faggot and it didn't happen by mistake. And if you're a faggot too, I hope you know you don't need to toughen up. You never have to stop prancing. You are not a mistake." - Noah Michelson, writing for the Huffington Post.

Ben Carson Files For Presidential Bid

I’ve decided to explore a potential run for the office of President because I believe my values, life experience, and willingness to speak the truth and seek solutions, prepares me well to lead our nation toward more prosperity, security, and freedom for every American. As I travel around the country to listen, learn and determine whether or not this is a race I can win, your financial support during the next two months will be extremely helpful. To make a secure contribution to my exploratory committee now, please go here. I look forward to working with you, and the rest of our fellow citizens to restore the promise of America. Thank you, and God Bless America.

RELATED: Last month the National Review revealed that the National Draft Ben Carson for President Super PAC isn’t affiliated with Carson and that none of the $13M already raised has actually gone to him. Carson's campaign manager pleads: "People giving money think it’s going to Dr. Carson and it’s not. Our hands are tied. We don’t want people exploited."

Matt Barber: Gay Marriage Ruling Will Be Sledgehammer To Destroy The Church

"If, God forbid, the Supreme Court somehow defines and manufactures a constitutional so-called right to sodomy-based marriage this summer, in June, if they do that then the floodgates will be open. There will be Christian persecution widespread across the United States and the so-called gay marriage agenda will be the sledgehammer used to crush the church and to crush religious liberty and the crush individual Christians, their finances, to ruin them. That's what this agenda was always about and that's what we will see if the Supreme Court goes the wrong way in June." - Matt Barber, speaking on the Liberty Counsel's radio program. In recent months Barber has twice published columns from advocates of executing all LGBT Americans.

"The consequences of Judge Bataillon’s decision are real: his injunction undermines the democratically expressed will of the people, and it undermines the role of the family in our basic social order. Marriage is the civil institution that unites children with their mothers and fathers, not just the public recognition of a committed relationship for the fulfillment of adults. Every child has the right to know, and as far as possible, be united with his or her mother and father. Governments ought to promote marriage between a man and a woman in order to ensure that children born from their union will realize that right. Supporting the rights of children has never been more clearly important. But rather than support the rights of children, Judge Bataillon has imposed on the people of Nebraska a new, adult-centric view of marriage. It is appropriate that Judge Bataillon issued a stay of his decision, allowing for immediate legal recourse. We ask all Catholics and people of good will to continue to fast and pray that God’s plan for marriage and family life will be affirmed." - Archbishop of Omaha George Lucas (seriously), via press release.

Bill Donohue Has Written A Book: Why Catholics Are Happy & Atheists Aren't

From the press materials:

The controversial president of The Catholic League shows how the Church may be the best guide for achieving long-term health and happiness. Religious Americans are by far the healthiest and happiest of any segment of the population—this is true across religions according to recent Gallup polls. Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League, goes a step further to show that Catholicism will not only make you healthy and happy, but it will ultimately lead you to heaven too. In his latest book, The Catholic Advantage, Donohue turns his attention to the ways Catholicism is experienced by believers. He explores a simplified and practical way of looking at the faith, demonstrating how Catholic living enhances our well-being. With exciting new research and time-honored wisdom, Donohue shows how the application of beliefs, bonds and boundaries lead to a bountiful life, while the atheism, narcissism, and hedonism of secular intellectuals and celebrity culture paves the path to misery.

The full title: The Catholic Advantage: Why Health, Happiness, and Heaven Await the Faithful. Here's why Donohue is personally happy:

Last June, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued a far-reaching administrative ruling that offered marital benefits for the first time to all of the United Nations’ lesbian and gay employees, as well as to other U.N. workers who had entered legally recognized domestic partnerships. On Monday, March 2, Russia gave the plan a resounding nyet.Speaking Monday morning at a meeting of the U.N.’s main budget committee, a Russian diplomat demanded that Ban reverse his decision on the matter, saying the U.N. chief’s action violated a U.N. General Assembly resolution that left it to U.N. employees’ governments to determine whether are eligible for spousal benefits. Moscow has been weighing whether to force a vote in the budget committee, known as the Fifth Committee, to halt funding such benefits, a vote that it likely could win. Unlike the U.N. Security Council, the United States and other big powers don’t have the power to veto votes in the Fifth Committee. While its decisions are generally made by consensus, states can call for a vote.“We will insist that the secretary-general urgently revoke the administrative bulletin” expanding benefits to same-sex couples, the Russian diplomat told the committee. Russia’s critics characterized the gambit as a cynical political maneuver aimed at checking the authority of a U.N. leader who has clashed with Moscow over its policies from Syria to Ukraine. Russia has transformed what is by all accounts a low-priority administrative dispute into a high-profile power struggle with the U.N. leader.

Russia's move is being opposed by the United States and the European Union. (Tipped by JMG reader Zhera)

Email Flap For Hillary Clinton

Thousands of emails Hillary Clinton generated as secretary of state were not archived as official government records because she used a private email account to conduct State Department business, the State Department acknowledged Monday. Aides to the former secretary of state turned over 55,000 pages of emails from her personal account to the State Department in December at its request, a department official said. Clinton’s use of the personal account for work-related emails and the State Department’s effort to gain control over the information were first reported by The New York Times. Clinton did not use a State Department email account, the paper reported. “Last year, the Department sent a letter to representatives of former secretaries of state requesting they submit any records in their possession for proper preservation. In response to our request, Secretary Clinton provided the Department with emails spanning her time at the Department,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement.

According to the Times, the email revelation came about due to the US House investigation into Benghazi. Security appears to be the major concern:

How many emails were in Mrs. Clinton’s account is not clear, and neither is the process her advisers used to determine which ones related to her work at the State Department before turning them over. “It’s a shame it didn’t take place automatically when she was secretary of state as it should have,” said Thomas S. Blanton, the director of the National Security Archive, a group based at George Washington University that advocates government transparency. “Someone in the State Department deserves credit for taking the initiative to ask for the records back. Most of the time it takes the threat of litigation and embarrassment.” Mr. Blanton said high-level officials should operate as President Obama does, emailing from a secure government account, with every record preserved for historical purposes. “Personal emails are not secure,” he said. “Senior officials should not be using them.” Penalties for not complying with federal record-keeping requirements are rare, because the National Archives has few enforcement abilities.How many emails were in Mrs. Clinton’s account is not clear, and neither is the process her advisers used to determine which ones related to her work at the State Department before turning them over.

CHINA: "Homowives" Advocate For The Rights Of Their Gay Husbands

Millions of Chinese gay men are believed to be in opposite sex marriages and some of their "homowives," as they are known in China, have begun to advocate for gay rights and same-sex marriage in a campaign to stop these loveless unions. Quartzreports:

“Homowives” and their supporters are getting more vocal about their own situations, and the need for China to become more accepting of homosexuality. Zhang Ziwei, a 27-year-old corporate secretary from Nanchang, southeast China’s Jiangxi Province, who dated a gay man three years ago, now manages a QQ chat group on the topic with more than one hundred members. She is translating two books—My Husband Is Gay and When Your Spouse Comes Out, written by Carol Grever, an American woman who married a gay man—into Chinese. After she finishes, she plans to send them to other women in her situation, because there are no such books in China.One woman who was formerly married to a gay man, who calls herself “Little Delan,” dressed in a bridal gown to seek marriage at the Qixi Festival, China’s Valentines’ Day, in August, 2014 on the the streets of Quanzhou, the largest city in southeastern Fujian Province. She told Chinese media that, besides finding the right man, she wanted to raise awareness about homowives, and the need for China to offer homosexuals equal rights and legalize gay marriage. Among the thousands who attended Hong Kong’s annual gay rights parade in November, Aunt Moon and the three women she was with became a peculiar scene with their different identities and pursuits from the gay marchers. During the march, they held up placards that read: “My husband is gay. I am in pain.”

Martin O'Malley: No Senate Run In 2016

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley says he will not seek the Senate seat of retiring Sen. Barbara Mikulski. He is keeping open his option of running for president in a Democratic primary likely to include Hillary Rodham Clinton. In a statement Tuesday, O'Malley praised Mikulski's service and says he expects that "very capable public servants with a desire to serve in the Senate will step up as candidates," and adds: "I will not be one of them." Mikulski announced plans to retire on Monday, giving O'Malley a second option if he wanted to skip what looks to be a longshot bid against Clinton. Little known outside his home state, O'Malley has yet to gain much traction in a hypothetical matchup against Clinton, who has a network of super PACs already working on her behalf and much of the party's establishment eagerly waiting for her to announce her candidacy.

Tea Party supporters are already floating Ben Carson as a possible replacement for Mikulski. Carson is registered to vote in Florida but owns a home in Maryland, a state which has not sent a Republican to the Senate since 1980.

Nebraska US House Rep Cheers Marriage

"Discrimination against anyone based on their sexual orientation has no place in this country. Courts across the country are demanding equal treatment under the law, and today, Nebraska took a major stand against inequality in this country. This decision does not ask individuals to abandon their principles on the issue, but rather, to accept that this country is overwhelmingly diverse, and we must embrace those who might not hold our same beliefs. The many differences of individuals are what make this a great nation, and today’s decision recognizes that same-sex couples deserve equal rights under the law. I applaud this decision and commit to continue working for equality for all Nebraskans in the future." - Rep. Brad Ashford (D-NE), via press release. Now in his first US House term, in 2013 Ashford ran for mayor of Omaha as an independent.

TRAILER: True Story

"In a refreshing change from past years, Republican hopefuls tried to verify their conservative credentials on the full-portfolio of issues. Leaders like Governor Scott Walker, who's been criticized for shunning social issues, put on a full-court press for non-negotiables like life. The shift was so palpable that reporters tried to explain it. The New York Times called it a short-term strategy. Others wondered if it was the genuine conversion that the Governor (who won second place in the straw poll) says it is. 'My views have changed,' Walker explained. Others, like Governor Jeb Bush, who I had the opportunity to meet privately with at CPAC, have some work to do persuading social conservatives on issues like marriage and Common Core. That said, the former Florida leader was very willing to listen -- especially on issues like religious liberty and same-sex 'marriage.' Although social issues may not be his first priority, I sensed he was genuinely interested in learning how to effectively work those themes into his overall messaging." - Hate group leader Tony Perkins, via email.

CHARLOTTE: City Council Rejects LGBT Rights Bill In 6-5 Vote Even After Stripping Transgender Restroom Protections

After its most contentious meeting in years, Charlotte City Council voted down the most controversial bill they have considered in years, an amended nondiscrimination ordinance that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to protected categories. The bill failed 6 to 5, with both supporters and opponents of the original bill voting against it. Council members voted to remove the section of the ordinance that would have allowed transgender people to use the bathroom of the gender they identify with. That issue drew the most vigorous opposition from dozens of speakers. “All over the world, there are restrooms for men and restrooms for women,” said council member Ed Driggs, a Republican. “It does not place an unreasonable burden on them and it does not stigmatize them.”

RELATED: In the clip below the Charlotte Observer recaps some of tonight's most virulently anti-gay speakers including Pastor Flip Benham. Also featured in the clip is Richard Pope, the douchecanoe who began the day by brandishing the below sign outside of the building.

UPDATE II: The Charlotte Observer has posted a second clip featuring excerpts from supporters of the ordinance.

qnotes has received two reports of confrontations of transgender people using the government center’s bathrooms, including one confrontation in which anti-LGBT street preacher Flip Benham, once convicted of stalking a local abortion doctor, confronted a 17-year-old transgender girl. Olivia, 17, told qnotes she went to use the women’s restroom on the second floor of the government center. Inside, everything was fine and she heard no complaints from the adult women in the restroom. But when she came out, Olivia says a man confronted her, called her a “young man” and said she shouldn’t have been in the women’s restroom. Olivia also said that Benham joined in the confrontation. Benham’s fellow activist, Ante Pavkovic, apparently recorded the incident, but Benham refused to show qnotes the video, saying he’ll send it to Shawn Hannity at Fox News. “I don’t want a pervert like yourself trying to misrepresent what happened in there when that young boy went into that bathroom with the young girls,” Benham said. The teenager said she responded angrily, calling Benham an “asshole,” but her mother, Darlena, said she felt Benham was the aggressor. She stepped between them. As they walked away, Benham allegedly said the teenager should be arrested. Benham called the teenager a “punk” and a “pervert” and claimed there were children in the restroom.

Headline Of The Day

The only thing crazier than the concept of an actual sharknado is the latest crop of actors(?) confirmed to appear in the Syfy saga’s upcoming third installment. Syfy on Monday added two more names to Sharknado 3‘s roster: mega mogul Mark Cuban and noted maniac Ann Coulter, who will be playing the President and Vice President of the United States of America, respectively. So in case you were wondering, yes, this is going to be a horror movie. That illustrious twosome joins a bevy of previously announced cast members plucked from yesteryear, including: Bo Derek, playing April’s mother May; Jerry Springer, playing manic tourist Mr. White; Chris Jericho, playing a roller coaster operator named Bruce; and Chris Kirkpatrick, playing… a pool life guard.

If Coulter meets the usual Sharknado gruesome end, at least we'll get some entertaining GIFs. (Tipped by JMG reader Tim)

Tweet Of The Day - Pastor Eat Da Poo Poo

Madonna Announces 2015 Tour Dates

Madge's last tour in 2012 was the top-grossing concert tour of that year, taking in an estimated $305 million. Her tours in this century alone have grossed over 1.2 billion. Ticket sales for the Rebel Heart tour begin tomorrow for Madonna fan club members and open to the general public on Monday when buyers will also get a "super deluxe" free download of the album plus six unreleased tracks. Ticket prices at Brooklyn's Barclays Center start at $55 and top out at $415. Until it sells out, of course, and then the resellers and scalpers will score their usual three and four times face value.

David Barton: The Bible Says There Will Never Be A Vaccine For HIV Because God Sent AIDS To Kill Homosexuals

HomoQuotable - Russell Tovey

"I feel like I could have been really effeminate, if I hadn’t gone to the school I went to. Where I felt like I had to toughen up. If I’d have been able to relax, prance around, sing in the street, I might be a different person now. I thank my dad for that, for not allowing me to go down that path. Because it’s probably given me the unique quality that people think I have. I get told, a lot, that I’m kind of carving my own path. That there are not many actors who are out and are able to play straight, and gay, and everyone’s OK with it." - Looking star Russell Tovey, speaking to the Guardian.

Freep This Nebraska Poll

Nebraska Turns Cerulean

The color will shift to mustard should the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals issue a stay. In January the Eighth Circuit declined to lift the stay in Missouri, which is shaded sapphire due to the legality of same-sex marriage in St. Louis and its recognition statewide. The Eighth Circuit will hear oral arguments in the cases out of Missouri, Arkansas, and South Dakota in May.

A Christian activist named Matt McLaughlin has filed a proposed ballot measure with the California Attorney General's office which would ask voters to approve the death penalty for homosexuality. Wonkette has tried to identify McLaughlin:

The ballot initiative filing with the AG’s office offers little in the way of clues to McLaughlin’s identity, but there is an address that matches that of a lawyer by that name and address on avvo.com. When we looked the address up, it turned out to be a Mail Box Express store in Huntington Beach. Huh. That is definitely not a law office! In approximately four minutes of thorough searching, we also couldn’t come up with any legal cases involving a Matthew G. McLaughlin, and then we suddenly had to go read all of the think pieces about what color that dress was (#TeamGoldAndWhite), so we got distracted.We DID get a hit on a Matt McLaughlin, lawyer, same Mail Box Express address, BOOM, who in 2004 submitted a citizen ballot initiative to give bibles to all public school kids in California, grades 1-12, because “great literature.” That initiative was way less crazy than the “sodomite” one (although still very crazy), and, as a Literate Person and also A English Major, we see the value of learning about how the Bible has impacted Western literature. More to the point, that initiative included an opt-out provision. However. Groups like the Anti-Defamation League and Americans United for Separation of Church and State were extremely suspicious, and McLaughlin didn’t collect the required number of signatures, so it didn’t go anywhere.

In order for the gay death penalty to be put to California voters, the backers of an initiative must pay the $200 filing fee (which has been done in this case) and then collect petition signatures equal to 5% of the total votes cast in the last gubernatorial election. Per the results of the 2014 election, McLaughlin must gather about 366K names. Below is opening text of his Sodomite Suppression Act.

"This is a call-to-action to all Christian believers, pastors, leaders, talk show hosts, media figures, activists, street evangelists and prayer warriors. Let us band together in the spirit of 2 Chronicles 7:14 to promote and conduct a continual prayer vigil and stand-out for marriage at SCOTUS (or any Federal Courthouse for those who can't get there) from now until the ruling comes out, probably in June. I am asking every Christian and pro-family radio talk host to promote this vigil, and perhaps do a broadcast from the site. Large organizations could provide logistical support to help people coordinate with groups scheduled to be there at a certain time but until then I will do my best to help at sdllaw@gmail.com.

"I am on my way to DC to kick this off spiritually (just me and my wife) with a stand-out from 11am-1pm on Monday the 9th and invite you'all to come or to send others to join us in prayer. I will do the same in front of my own local federal courthouse in Springfield MA over the next few weeks and months at times to be announced. In the meantime, don't wait for somebody else to organize your vigil, just go! This is our last stand for marriage as a free society. If SCOTUS declares 'gay marriage' a constitutional right by judicial fiat there will be nothing left for us to do but resist. Only God can save us from the calamity and disgrace of defiling His institution of marriage in our official national policy." - Scott Lively, in a press release published today by Christian Newswire.

SNL: You've Just Been Ginsburned

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) To Retire

The longest serving woman in Congress in U.S. history is ready to retire. Maryland Democrat Barbara Mikulski will not seek a sixth term in the Senate in 2016. Mikulski made the announcement at a news conference in the Fells Point neighborhood in Baltimore Monday morning. "I am here today ... to announce I will not be seeking a sixth term in the United States Senate," Mikulski said. "This is a hard decision to make." "Do I spend my time raising money or spend my time raising hell?" the Maryland Democrat said is a question that factored into her decision. Mikulski, whose direct and feisty character paved the way for women who joined the male-dominated Senate, joined the upper chamber in 1987 after ten years in the U.S. House. The 78-year old intends to serve out the remainder of her current term until January 2017. Mikulski is currently the top Democrat on the powerful Appropriations Committee. She was the first woman to chair the committee responsible for determining and allocating government funding when she took the gavel in December of 2012.

Mikulski is a longtime and ardent LGBT ally and has a 100% rating from the Human Rights Campaign.

Dana Loesch: Gays Could Be Stoned In The Streets Over Public Accommodations

During the discussion, Loesch said that if America doesn’t protect the supposed "right" of Christians to discriminate against gays in public accommodations, it will eventually lead to gays being stoned to death in the streets. Loesch claimed that a lot of atheists who listen to her radio program worry that not protecting this "right" to discriminate could end up with gays being stoned in public. "You don't have to be a Christians to be affected by loss of religious liberty, because if one liberty is taken, more liberties will be taken," she said. "If I'm not speaking up [while] you're losing rights then what will happen to me when the day comes, if someone comes to me? What if you're stoned for walking out in the street for being gay? I mean, come on, that's where the conversation needs to go."

Signorile Interviews Schlafly At CPAC

“The gays have their argument about inevitability,” the 90-year-old author of 25 books told me in an interview for SiriusXM Progress at this year's Conservative Political Action Conference in National Harbor, Maryland, over the weekend, during a book-signing including her new book, Who Killed the American Family? "I don’t think that’s so,” Schlafly continued with a smile, rejecting the “inevitability” argument. “I’m extremely disappointed that the Republican Party, the conservative movement, even the Democratic Party and the churches, have been saying, ‘Well soon the court will decide, and that will be it.’ Well, a lot of people thought that about Roe v. Wade, and we’ve seen the whole abortion movement turned around in the last ten years.” Schlafly has sloughed off the fact that even her own son is gay. (John Schlafly was revealed to be gay in the gay press back in the early '90s and confirmed the reports, but defended his mother and continued working for her.) She’d explained that her son "supports me in everything I do," including fighting what she views as the dangers of "the gay agenda."

SCOTUS: Same-Sex Marriage Opponents Must Reveal Names Of Their Donors

The Supreme Court has turned away an appeal from same-sex marriage opponents in California who want to keep the identities of their campaign donors secret. The justices on Monday let stand a lower court ruling against ProtectMarriage.com, the National Organization for Marriage and other supporters of a 2008 ballot initiative that outlawed same-sex marriages in California until the ban was overturned five years later. The groups sought to conceal their past and future campaign finance records because they feared harassment of donors. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against them in part because the names have been publicly available for five years. State law requires political committees to identify those who contribute more than $100 during or after a campaign, along with the donor's address, occupation and employer.

"I believe God is sending a warning to America to stop siding with Israel’s enemies. President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry are actively campaigning against the interests of the nation of Israel – our greatest ally and the only democracy in the Middle East. Prime Minister Netanyahu has become a political target to the Obama administration for speaking the truth! Barack Obama obviously does not understand the potential fallout from his administration’s dangerous actions. The Bible says that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – Israel’s omnipotent defender – takes very seriously all attempts to harm His people, the Jews. In the book of Joel, we read that God will ultimately judge the nations that try to divide the land of Israel – something the Obama White House has consistently proposed. And Zechariah 12:9 plainly says, 'I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.' Liberty Counsel holds that America has been blessed by God because our national policy has been favorable toward the nation of Israel since its founding in 1948. If we allow the Obama administration to subvert this policy, a price will be paid!" - Liberty Counsel head Mat Staver, in a posting to a website which has twice published columns from advocates of executing homosexuals.

Don’t do it Charlotte! Should Christian photographers in Charlotte be required to photograph a same-sex wedding ceremony? Should a Christian t-shirt printer be required to print t-shirts for a gay pride parade? Should a Christian adoption agency be required to place a child with a same-sex couple? No, of course not. Unfortunately, Charlotte businesses could soon be forced to make the difficult choice between providing services and promoting messages that violate their religious beliefs or facing legal harassment and financial penalties. This expansion of Charlotte’s nondiscrimination law would not only threaten the religious liberty of Christian business owners, but it will also threaten the safety of women and children in Charlotte’s public restrooms because it will require public restrooms to be open to use by persons of any sex. This means that any man claiming to identify as a woman would be allowed to use a public women’s restroom!